"We need to know what we have, and that it will be safe over winter."

The state the storehouse had been in before he'd started working on it, food might not have lasted over winter. They'd managed in the first year; the damage had been from the earthquakes, or storms, or one of the recent disasters that had happened, and there are more people to feed now than there had been at first.

Gracchus gestures towards the door of the storehouse, in invitation for Kate Kelly to come in if she wishes to talk to him. It's hardly equipped for dining, but there are things for people to sit on, as people do here while they eat. He won't go, though, unless or until she does.

"That was while I was quaestor. I managed the supplies and money for the army. But I did many other things when I was tribunus plebis. I had many new ..." He pauses, struggling for a word to describe plebiscitia in English. "Rules made for public money and administration, for building roads and starting a town and supplying food to the people. It is difficult to explain, I am not sure of the words in English."